While our tongue is only able to detect five basic tastes (sweet, sour, salty, bitter and savory), our nose is capable of detecting millions of different aromas. And that’s how we enjoy all the wonderful “flavors” that food and drinks have to offer.
When wine tasting, one of the Five S’s is smell. You place the wine glass directly under your nose and inhale deeply. This can allow you to get a very quick idea of what the wine will taste like and you may even detect some of the wine’s fruit and herbal aromas. But after just a couple of sniffs, your nose tends to become less sensitive to further sniffs of the same aromas.
One way wineries and wine tasting rooms will address this issue is to re-set your olfactory system by having you smell a small container of coffee beans. This shifts the receptors in your nose and brain to something completely different. That way, when you sniff your next wine, your sense of smell is reset and once again heightened.
But you may not always have coffee beans with you when you are tasting wines. The one thing that you always have with you is your arm. And it can come in very handy when wanting to reset your nose. Just take a quick sniff of your bare arm, right in the crease of your elbow (preferably while not wearing any scented lotions, sunscreen or other scented products). This quickly resets your nose and allows you to get back to smelling the intricate wine aromas.
So, try this quick trick next time you are wine tasting to experience all the wonderful aromas that wines have to offer. Cheers!